What Do You Do When You’ve Been Served With a Family Lawsuit?

Being served with a lawsuit is never easy, especially if you were surprised that your spouse or ex wanted to get a divorce, ask for custody or support, or even modify an existing agreement/order that you had. How do you tell your children? How do you tell your family and friends? If you were served by a process server while you with people you knew, this may have even been an embarrassing experience for you as well. Being served with divorce or custody papers is the equivalent of your spouse suing you for a divorce or custody and being involved in litigation can get complicated and overwhelming.

“What Will I Be Served With?”

In Texas, there are two documents that must be served on the party (at the same time) for service to be proper:

A Citation and

Petition

Quite simply, a citation is a notification issued by the Court that tells you that you are being sued. A petition is a document filed by the party doing the suing that will lay out their relief requested by the Court. This is why the first person to file a petition is called a Petitioner. The person being served is called a Respondent since the Respondent must respond to the lawsuit. The Petition for divorce will state the basis for the Petitioner wanting the divorce to be granted. The most common basis for divorces in Texas is for insupportability which in essence, means that the parties no longer get along or have grown apart. Insupportability is the most common grounds in Texas for which a divorce is granted. However, some other grounds for the divorce (and which may be in your divorce petition) could include grounds such as abandonment and adultery, to name a couple. If it is a custody case, the documents served will also state the basis for the Petitioner’s suit.

Additionally, sometimes you will be served with other documents in addition to a Citation and Petition. You may also be served with a Precept and Notice of Hearing (tells you that a hearing has been set and provides a date, location, and time for the hearing to take place) and a Temporary Restraining Order (is a temporary restraint on the parties ability to do a list of things while the suit is pending).

Note: a Court may issue a Temporary Restraining Order without hearing testimony. Some common restraints found in a TRO could include the restriction against removing the children of the suit from their schools, moving or withdrawing money from financial accounts, making disparaging comments about the other party in the earshot of the children, hiding the children from the other parent, etc.

This brings us to examining what an answer is.

What is an Answer?

Whenever a person is sued (even for divorce), the Court requires that a written answer be filed (and served) by the Petitioner. Filing an answer is vital if you want to ensure that you will get your day in Court; filing an answer will ensure that a default judgment won’t be issued against you. The Answer is a direct response to the petition filed against you (discussed above) and is a short document that typically denies or admits all or some of the items alleged in the petition. You must file and serve the answer on the Petitioner, or if they’ve hired an attorney, you must serve it on their attorney directly. This can all be overwhelming but ignoring this deadline won’t do you any favors in the long-run so be sure to take this deadline seriously.

Do it When the Time is Right: When to File Your Answer

When being involved in any lawsuit, deadlines are important and cannot be ignored or otherwise disregarded. Filing a timely answer is essential if you want to have your rights protected in the suit. In Texas, a responding party has about thirty (30) days to file an answer, but technically a party must file an answer by Monday at 10 o’clock a.m. after the expiration of 20 days after the date that the party was served with the petition and citation; any answer filed after this deadline will be considered to be untimely.

What is a (TRO) Temporary Restraining Order ?

A TRO is governed by Texas Rules of Civil Procedure Rule 680 and Texas Family Code § 150.001.

Many parties that are served with a Temporary Restraining Order feel overwhelmed and confused. The words “restraining order” can just sound scary. Some people may even feel offended that their spouse has sought one.

A Temporary Restraining Order, as briefly discussed above, must be served on you. If you have an attorney, the TRO will likely be served to your attorney directly. Again, a TRO is a set of restrictions issued by the Court that is meant to protect both parties from acts or omissions of the other, especially if a spouse is alleging that the other committed domestic violence. Just like the name implies, a TRO is not indefinite but instead it is an order that will be in effect until the case has concluded or until the court determines that it should be terminated before the end of the case. A TRO may be issued without any testimony being first heard by the Court.

In Texas, the Courts aim to protect the parties, their children, and their property. In furtherance of this goal, courts typically restrict each party in some of the following ways:

Getting your children and moving with them to another state

Withdrawing the money out of joint bank accounts

Canceling or changing insurance policies, such as health and auto

changing the beneficiaries on a life insurance policy

Committing family violence

Making disparaging comments about the other spouse in the presence of the children

Withdrawing the children from school without the other parent’s consent

Removing money from a retirement account

Hiding or secreting the children from the other parent

Communicating (or otherwise threatening) the other party via mail, phone, in-person, or in any other manner

Destroying, removing, or encumbering property without the permission of the other

There are many restrictions that could be ordered that are not listed here; this is not a comprehensive list.

“What if the Court Lacks Jurisdiction Over Me?”

Jurisdiction is just another word for ‘power.’ Jurisdiction is a Court’s power to hear and decide a case. For a Texas court to have jurisdiction in a divorce, it must have something called personal jurisdiction over the parties. In other words, the Court must have the power over the persons in the suit to issue binding orders. Just ask yourself: “Would it be fair for this Court to have jurisdiction over me?”

How does a Court Establish Personal Jurisdiction in Texas?

In Texas, Personal Jurisdiction exists where one of the following is present:

Domicile (Residing with the Intent to remain): The Respondent is domiciled in the state;

Contacts: The Respondent has minimum contacts with the state;

Business: The Respondent does business in the state;

Presence (Cannot be fraudulently lured into the state): The Respondent was personally served while in the state; or

Consent (Could be given in a premarital agreement): The Respondent agrees to submit to the Court’s jurisdiction.

If you do not meet any of the above requirements for personal jurisdiction, be sure that you wish to submit to that Court’s jurisdiction before you file an answer. If you file your answer before you object to the Court’s jurisdiction, it will be the equivalent of consenting to the court’s jurisdiction, which would give the court Personal Jurisdiction over you.

Just because the Court lacks personal jurisdiction over you does not mean that you should not respond to the lawsuit, however. If you’d like to object to the Court’s personal jurisdiction, a Special Appearance must be filed before or concurrent with the answer. A Special Appearance is a pleading that tells the Court that although you are indeed responding to the lawsuit, you are not submitting to the Court’s personal jurisdiction. You may want to contact an attorney for assistance concerning a Special Appearance and the requirements to file one.

Am I Automatically Divorced Once I file My Answer?

A common misconception is that if the Respondent agrees to be divorced, the Respondent can merely file an answer and then the divorce is granted. Filing an answer is just the beginning. A divorce won’t be granted until the judge signs the Final Divorce Decree (in Texas typically parties must wait 60 days before a judge will sign). In other words, if you have been served with divorce papers, expect to be involved in the suit for at least a few months.

What is a Counterpetition?

Once you have filed your answer, you may even wish to file a Counterpetition for divorce. Essentially, a counter petition is when the responding party (after or concurrent with filing his/her answer) sues the Petitioner back. This document is completely optional. Think about it like this: When your spouse served you with the divorce papers they were petitioning the Court to grant them a divorce based off of the information that they provided in their petition. That means that you will be on the defensive in the sense that you will be admitting, acknowledging, or denying and thereby litigating only the Petitioner’s claims and sought relief. So, if the respondent is not successful and the suit gets dismissed for any reason, that is the end of the suit. You do not then get to continue the lawsuit on their claims. In a counterpetition, the Respondent has the opportunity to state his/her sought grounds for divorce and any legal allegations against the petitioner. Therefore, if you file a counter petition, neither party may simply drop the suit without both parties agreeing to it, and both parties’ claims are allowed to be heard by the Court. This is why filing a counterpetition could be a major step towards protecting your rights in the divorce proceeding.

Do I Need a Lawyer to get Divorced?

The answer to this question is quite simple, it depends.

Pro Se Parties vs. Parties with Counsel

A pro se party is a party that does not have legal representation. In Texas, you may get divorced without the help from a lawyer. However, since divorces can get complicated and often have complex issues, hire an attorney may be in your best interests. If any of the following describe you, you should contact an experienced Family Law Attorney that has experience with some of the same issues that you may face in your divorce.

There are children involved in the suit and custody, support or visitation is in dispute.

There is a large community or separate estate.

You suspect that your spouse has committed fraud against the marital estate.

There are complex property division issues in the divorce (including property abroad).

The division of assets is in dispute.

The other party has an attorney (and you don’t).

Issues or fear of international child abduction exists.

You have been served with a Deposition Notice.

You want more detailed and personalized pleadings to be filed on your behalf.

You would like to apply for spousal maintenance.

Your spouse has requested spousal maintenance, and you do not believe that you should either have to pay it or if you’d like

the amount of support to be less.

You would like guidance on the legal process.

In other words, if you and your spouse are not in 100% agreement on how the property will be divided into final orders and (if there are children) the custody and visitation schedule (and amount of support to be paid), then you may need to consult with an attorney to better protect your rights.

Dallas

The information on this website is for general information purposes only.
Nothing on this site should be taken as legal advice for any individual
case or situation. This information is not intended to create, and receipt
or viewing does not constitute, an attorney-client relationship.

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